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Kimura Tatsuya
Kimura Tatsuya (木村 • タツヤ lit. kimura tatsuya, formerly 木村 • 達也) is a major supporting character in Hajime no Ippo. He is a junior lightweight boxer. Along with Makunouchi Ippo, Takamura Mamoru, Aoki Masaru, and Itagaki Manabu, he rounds out the core members of the Kamogawa Boxing Gym. His main fights in the series are against Mashiba Ryou and Eleki Battery. His surname is Kimura. In Japan, surnames are listed before given names. History Kimura and Aoki Masaru were best friends since kindergarten. In high school they began brawling and causing trouble with students from rival schools, namely North High, which eventually led to their expulsion. Kimura was the most affected by this because he was worried he had disappointed his mother. One day the pair attacked North High's Takamura Mamoru and lost miserably. Seeing Takamura's strength as a boxer, they decided to join the Kamogawa Boxing Gym to try and become strong too. Despite losing to him in every spar, they continued boxing until they had earned their pro licenses and stepped into the ring. Eventually they forgot about their grudge and became passionate about boxing itself. They now look up to Takamura. Kimura's main fight in the series is against Mashiba Ryou for the JBC Junior Lightweight championship. The fight was animated in the Kimura vs. Mashiba OVA; Kimura lost despite inventing a new signature move and putting in his best efforts. He also fought twice against Eleki Battery, a national champion. Both fights ended as draws. Kimura's main role in the story is that of a supporting character, but upon his and Aoki's second entry into the Class A Tournament, they became directly antagonized by Iga Shinobu and his trainer, Baron Kurita. They are now both aiming to settle their grudge with the duo. Match History Appearance Lookwise Kimura looks very much like his former kouhai Miyata. He has a pale skin complexion, somewhat of a big nose and big black eyes and thin eyebrows. It is noted by Itagaki that Kimura is moderately handsome. His training outfit is either a green jumpsuit or a blue t-shirt with pants During his younger days with Aoki he used to sport a pompadour but was made to drop it when he joined the Kamogawa Crew. Nicknames, etc Personality Kimura is a smart boxer with a good eye. He lives with his parents and helps them run their flower shop, but makes most of his living from his fights. He has been known to come up with his own original training methods, such as Shadow Boxing to music. He also tends to speak more politely and can often narrowly avoid Takamura's pranks through guile, and shifting the brunt of the blame on to Aoki. He and Aoki Masaru are best friends and are sometimes referred to as AoKimura (青木村). He tends to be less hard on Ippo than the others and more willing to assist in his training, although he does still tease him occasionally. While Takamura and Aoki often show concern for Ippo, Kimura is the closest of the three of them to being an ideal senpai. He is not above being petty or jealous and gloating. An example would be when he refused to stop celebrating Mashiba's suspension and Sawamura's retirement (as it meant he had less obstacles for the belt), despite Ippo's protests. Kimura's pathetic love life and constant lack of a girlfriend is a recurring joke in the series, and he even named his pet fish Reiko after a girl who broke his heart. Like Aoki, he is also highly skilled at baseball, particularly as batter, but as the two of them became delinquents, they lost interest in the sport and abandoned it. He originally wrote his given name in kanji as 達也, but switched to katakana as タツヤ after returning from a brief retirement. Fighting Style Like Aoki, his boxing ability is also downplayed for much of the series (albeit not quite as badly). Despite this, he has proven to be a good boxer with solid all-around ability. Miyata stated that as a boxer, Kimura had no weaknesses (despite also not having any strengths) and Miyata's father said that although he was only ranked third before his fight with Mashiba, his talent surpassed that ranking. Mashiba himself admitted that Kimura was his strongest challenger. He shows strength around the level of a national champion, as he was able to draw with Eleki Battery twice and only barely lost to Mashiba. As fast outboxer, Kimura is often asked to be a sparring partner for as Makunouchi and one time for Miyata, though Kimura benefited more from Miyata's sparring. Techniques *Counter *Dragon Fish Blow Weaknesses In the lead-up to Kimura's fight against Mashiba, Miyata identifies Kimura's biggest flaw: as a well-rounded fighter he has no specific weaknesses, but he also has no strengths. Kimura comes to the same realisation when he manages to slip pass Miyata's jabs, but realises he has no plan of attack with the distance closed. Notably, his lack of a Sunday punch makes it difficult for him to intimidate his opponents. While Kimura does come up with the Dragon Fish Blow, he still does not have an emphasis on particular strengths, unlike Makunouchi's in-fighting or Miyata's counters. Gallery Aokimura.png|Kimura with his best friend Aoki. Kimura.png|Kimura ready to fight! K stance..jpeg|Kimura getting unconscious right when the time was to throw a punch to Mashiba. Trivia *He came up with his Dragon Fish Blow when he was feeding his fish *On one occasion, while Ippo was waiting for Miyata to appear at the gym following their second spar, Ippo mistakenly took Kimura's silhouette for Miyata. Category:Active boxers Category:Male characters Category:Characters from Japan Category:Kamogawa Boxing Gym Category:Junior Lightweights Category:Out Boxers Category:Boxers Category:Orthodox Boxers Category:Characters from Tokyo Category:Characters